For many years there has existed a problem in the lighting of a fire in that one may be required to light the fire numerous times before the material for the fire is truly kindled. The most common effort at solving the problem has been the use of easily combustible material such as paper, pine knots, pine cones and the like, the idea being to light the easily combustible material and allow the easily combustible material to kindle the wood, coal or other substance for the fire. The difficulty with this arrangement is that the easily combustible material frequently is totally consumed before the larger pieces of wood or coal are burning well enough to sustain a flame. In this event, one must of course repeat the process, perhaps using a greater quantity of the easily combustible material. It has also be known simply to use a highly flammable substance, such as petroleum product--kerosine, naphtha, etc.--poured on the fire. This of course ignites extremely easily, but it is likely that the material for the fire will not be hot enough to sustain a flame before the petroleum product is consumed. Additionally, the explosive nature of many of the petroleum products renders them very hazardous to use in such fashion.
Another frequently attempted solution to the problem has been to fabricate a brick, tablet, block or the like that will be relatively easy to ignite and will remain burning long enough to light the other material for the fire. These devices have taken numerous forms, frequently including the form of cellulosic material, sometimes impregnated with a flammable substance, and frequently covered in paraffin or other relatively non-volatile material. The prior art fire starting tablets or blocks have numerous drawbacks, some requiring the inclusion of oxygen yielding compounds to assure a continued burning once ignited, some of the devices will ignite so rapidly as to be dangerous, while some will ignite so slowly as to be difficult to maintain. Also, when one considers fire starting devices in the present day, one must consider the use of charcoal, and the very small blocks or tablets will not produce a sufficiently broad flame to ignite more than one or two charcoal briquettes, resulting in a very time consuming process, or the use of a large number of such tablets.